Singapore Airlines

[brattzz]

$1.5k bad twitter is nothing to SIA..

It's the biz model which is confusing and burning $ at a very quick pace! ... can SIA be both Premium and Budget at the same time?

Either way, the passenger volumes remains same, yet divided!

[Belg]

This online ranting is nothing new to SIA as I suspect this CO might be trying his luck to get this waived or even get other benefits in the process.

I am equally baffled by their biz model which I hope will change for the better.. After all, it is supposed to be a good advertisement of SG globally.

[specuvestor]

Not sure is it chow kuan or some fault by the flight crew. There should be some agreement form signed before selling this service to avoid this issue. In the end, it all boils down to the SIA brand. In the service industry, customer still is always right. This twitter tweet is a small ripple in the pond that has already show cracks in the armoury.

What I mean by scholarly management is mainly pointing at the top creme who lives in their ivory tower and forgetting the main focus of the business. How can we forget the top leaders of SIA - Pillay, who very much captures the industry's focus on the customer and to create the touch point. Many good people has left to other airlines now and it can be easily seen who are having the best creme now.
Good leaders (Ow, FF Wong, Chaoren) in average companies can do wonders.. While mediocre leaders in good companies lose focus too many times, driving down the cash hoard.

I hope SIA prove me wrong by clearing this amicably and also turning it's business around.

In theory SIA is right to charge. In real world SIA is dumb to cream unsuspecting customers in a highly service oriented industry. A better way is to have a sort of prepaid wi-fi rather post paid

Leaves very bad taste for a premium airline trying to make money like a budget airline

[cfa]

Sim Lim square spirit spreads to air ?

[touzi]

In theory SIA is right to charge. In real world SIA is dumb to cream unsuspecting customers in a highly service oriented industry. A better way is to have a sort of prepaid wi-fi rather post paid

Leaves very bad taste for a premium airline trying to make money like a budget airline

Unless the article from Today is wrong, I think the system is already idiot proof.

Price plans are either volume based (e.g. US$9.99 for 10 MB) or time-based (e.g. US$11.95 for 1 hour). When logging in, you must between two options: being automatically logged out once you’ve reached your data limit, or staying logged in even when exceeding your data limit.

[Belg]

Verdict... it is really another Chao kuan customer.. then again. . It has already been a culture with SQ.. bang table works.

[specuvestor]

Idiot prove or not, in a highly service oriented industry you dont want the idiot customer to make you look like the idiot. My guess is SIA refuse to waive or negotiate down the fee. Strictly speaking no argument SIA is legally right

Bang table of course works if u want him to be a repeat customer. SLS is not expecting repeating customers

It is the nature of the highly service oriented industry: from credit cards to restaurants. Standard Chartered lost me as a customer for past 15years because they did not waive a simple fee. Can SIA afford to do that or it has a value proposition that no one else has?

[Belg]

Idiot prove or not, in a highly service oriented industry you dont want the idiot customer to make you look like the idiot. My guess is SIA refuse to waive or negotiate down the fee. Strictly speaking no argument SIA is legally right

Bang table of course works if u want him to be a repeat customer. SLS is not expecting repeating customers

It is the nature of the highly service oriented industry: from credit cards to restaurants. Standard Chartered lost me as a customer for past 15years because they did not waive a simple fee. Can SIA afford to do that or it has a value proposition that no one else has?

SIA won the battle but lost the war, if they didn't do anything to appease this non returning customer. Likewise, if they do go all out to waive it for him, it would create a precedent. Either way, the company has to have the foresight to react to such events if they would to turn Sq around.

I understand your frustrations with standchart for not being service oriented, cos 15 yrs ago they are too snobbish to know how to do business in Asia. Without rapport or 关系, nowhere long term business can be done.

Quite recently, SC carried out a mess reduction of headcount prior to alot of hot promotion to capture more account/credit holders. It is a tad too late don't u think for them to recover what could have been a different customer experience for u 15 years ago?

[corydorus]

I think the situation is similar to telco charging customer who uses data oversea. I think one incident not going to have any meaningful impact if at all.
If SIA returns the money, is out of goodwill. I think SIA should, as the system probably did not block user for accessing further.

[greengiraffe]

Qantas CFO tips a return to profit for international division
THE AUSTRALIAN NOVEMBER 17, 2014 12:00AM

Steve Creedy

Aviation Editor
Sydney
Gareth Evans, new Qantas Chief Financial Officer (CFO) at their Mascot headquarters in Sydney.
Gareth Evans, Qantas chief financial officer, predicts a return to profit Source: News Corp Australia

QANTAS chief financial officer Gareth Evans says he is now certain the airline group will get its loss-making international operations back into the black and he believes the “substantial headwinds’’ it has faced are abating.

Qantas International has long been the group’s problem child and making it profitable would pave the way for investment in new aircraft such as Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner.

The CFO’s comments came as the group as a whole is on track for a profitable first half. Analysts are boosting their full-year expectations on the back of lower fuel prices and an expected $600 million benefit from the restructuring of the business.

Mr Evans said management had made substantial changes to Qantas International in the past three to five years, but the unit had been flying against significant headwinds.

“The international business is going to perform considerably better this year than the previous year for a number of reasons,” he said in Seattle yesterday. “Obviously a significant amount of the transformation benefits come through the international business. It’s still early days on the transformation, there’s still a long way to go, but we’re performing excellently and the benefits are coming through every month and it’s a strong pipeline.”

The airline was being helped by a more benign competitive environment driven by factors such as the lower Australian dollar and losses by competitors on routes to Australia, Mr Evans said.

Depreciation charges would be about $200m less after the airline wrote down its fleet at its annual results to more accurately reflect the value of its aircraft ­because of structural changes to Qantas International that would allow greater foreign investment.

Qantas International also boosted revenue by restructuring its international network with more efficient uses of its assets, including adding Airbus A380s on Dallas and retiming its Melbourne-London, as well as new and increased services.

Management was accelerating changes at international and the transformation program was going to “shine through’’.

“We believe we’re going to see the effects of the transformation shine through because we’re doing it in an environment where we’re not up against substantial headwinds that we’ve had in the past,’’ he said.

“And we can achieve getting the business back into profits, which I am certain we will.”

Mr Evans would not put a date on the return to profitability and reiterated the group’s stance that it would not order new planes until it was back in the black.

He said there was “economic life” in the current fleet that needed to be used up but he acknowledged a decision on new planes would have to be made in the next few years and the airline would be looking at “the best and newest technology”.

Qantas has options and purchase rights on 50 Boeing 787-9s at a heavily discounted price originally negotiated with Boeing. The options come with a price and a delivery slot while purchase rights guarantee the price, but Qantas would need to negotiate delivery timing. It will need to make a decision on first delivery slot in 2017 by the end of next year but is under no pressure to take the early planes. Mr Evans did not rule out a look at Airbus’s competing A350 aircraft but said the 787 was a “great aircraft’’.

“We think it’s going to be a greater aircraft over time … it’s going to be a very a popular aircraft,’’ he said. “We’ve got great flexibility and great availability for that aircraft and at some point in the next few years we’ll want to make a re-fleeting decision for the international business. The 787-9 appears to be a fantastic ­option for us.’’

Asked about the Boeing 777-X, Mr Evans said Qantas International would probably need new planes before the expected delivery date of the B777 derivative at the turn of the decade.

He dismissed as incorrect rumours that Qantas had a Boeing 777-X project team looking at the revamped twin-aisle plane but he confirmed Qantas was talking to Boeing and other manufacturers about aircraft in the development pipeline, including the 777-X.

He said speculation that Qantas was working with alliance partner Emirates to tap into Boeing 777 orders was “rubbish’’.

The reporter travelled to Seattle courtesy of Qantas and Boeing.